put.io Review

As a cloud torrent service, put.io is not your regular cloud storage, backup service, or a cyberlocker that allows you to share uploaded content. Instead, the platform downloads and stores the content to its servers where you can access it locally from put.io via any web browser or a dedicated app.

And by ‘accessed’, you don’t even need to download it back onto your device. You, and some family members depending on the plan, can stream video content such as TV shows, movies, and various other types of content directly from put.io.

Pricing and plans

Pricing for put.io mainly depends on how much storage space you require, starting with 100GB. The 10 TB option is impressively enormous and only makes sense if numerous people (up to 9 family members) are sharing the same account. And even then its a lot of storage!

Besides increased storage, more expensive plans offer perks such as higher seed ratios, increased active transfers, and the ability to invite additional family members. All plans offer unlimited downloads to and from put.io.

A 17% discount is available if you purchase annually. This brings, for example, the price of the 100 GB plan down to $8.25 per month. It is possible to buy a 1-day trial for $0.99 and put.io offers a 1-week “no friction” money-back guarantee.

Payment is via card, Amazon Payments, and Nano. It is also possible to pay in ways that are partially anonymous, using a selection of cryptocurrencies, US gift cards, and voucher codes, which can be purchased from various digital code providers.

Please remember, though, that put.io will know your IP address regardless unless you hide the complete transaction with a VPN.

Features

Streams video content from put.io without the need to download it locally

Will seed for you

Can share content with other family members (plan dependent)

Accepts anonymous payment methods

Web interface

Multi-platform support

Browser extensions

RSS automation

Upload files

No upload redundancy

Will seed for you

BitTorrent is a filesharing protocol that only works when users share content they have downloaded themselves, and others actually want to download said content. We know this sharing process as seeding and it is good netiquette no matter where you source your torrents from.

A 1:1 seeding ratio is considered the minimum required to satisfy good netiquette. That is, seeding as much data as you have leeched (downloaded).

At least a 1:1 seed/leech ratio is expected, if not more.

Many private (invitation-only) websites, however, enforce strict rules about how much you are required to seed. These often require seed ratios much higher than 1:1, and failure to comply usually results in your invitation to the website being revoked.

When using private trackers, put.io will automatically seed all torrents to a ratio determined by the plan you purchase. On the basic (100 GB) plan it will seed to a ratio of 2:1, or for 10 days (whichever comes first). For public trackers, put.io will seed to a ratio 1:1, or for 1 day (whichever comes first).

It is worth noting here that the line between “cloud torrent services” and “torrent seedbox” services is very blurry. With seedboxes, though, there is often a strong focus on unlimited seeding to boost seed ratios on private trackers. put.io’s seed limits, although generous, push it towards the cloud service side of the line.

Multi-platform support

On desktops, put.io is accessed via its web console. It also supports an impressive number of platforms via apps and integrations.

We are as bemused as we are impressed that the official put.io iOS and Apple TV apps are available through the App Store, when Apple bans all regular BitTorrent clients.

It is interesting that there is no official Android app (despite there being one for Android TV), but this space has fortunately been filled by perfectly capable third-party apps.

As we can see, put.io plays to its strengths by focusing strongly on apps and integrations that allow you to stream video content direct from put.io to big-screen TVs.

RSS automation

As a common feature on regular BitTorrent clients, put.io allows you to subscribe to torrent feeds via RSS. This is mainly useful for downloading new episodes of a TV series as they become available, but can also be handy for getting new versions of software, new magazine and comic issues, and suchlike.

No upload redundancy

If you add a torrent, and the same torrent already exists on put.io’s servers because it was added by another user, then it is added to your library instantly without the need to re-download it.

Performance

Downloading to put.io

We often struggled to find content that did not already exist on put.io’s servers, meaning that popular torrents almost always became instantly available in our library.

put.io servers are already full of content

We did, however, eventually find an obscure 1.83 GB torrent for test purposes that was not already stored on the put.io servers. After a short wait for 3 peers to become available, it took 19 minutes to download to our library.

In the often unlikely event that you find a more popular torrent (with more peers) that is not already available on put.io, then download speeds would undoubtedly be faster.

Downloading locally

Video and music content can be steamed and eBooks can be previewed without the need to download them locally. But you may wish to, and for content such as games and other programs, you will need to.

put.io runs a number of servers around the world, aimed at making downloading locally as fast as possible. We are based in the UK and have a quick broadband connection (380+ Mbits/ download), so any slowdown of local download speeds is likely due to bandwidth issues at put.io’s end or poor ISP peering arrangements.

According to its own speed tests, these are the relevant figures for us:

In practice, it took us 1:29 minutes to download a 3.25 GB file from the London server. We reckon this is good enough for most people!

Privacy & Security

Jurisdiction

PUTIO Internet Hizmetleri AS. is based in Turkey. Since the military coup in 2016, Turkey has been subject to heightened levels of government surveillance and censorship. Copyright laws in Turkey are in broad accordance with international norms, but as far as we can tell, there is little appetite for enforcing them strongly.

Privacy policy

The IP addresses of website visitors are logged, and their actions on the website tracked using session IDs that expire when the browser is closed. Various web trackers collect aggregate data, which is not supposed to be personally identifiable.

We presume mobile apps and suchlike collect all the stuff similar apps usually do, but this is not detailed in the privacy policy.

A feature we like, though, is the ability to either clear all your account data or go nuclear and destroy your account. Naturally, we need to trust that put.io will do what it says as a closed source platform, but it is still a nice feature.

Technical security

A big advantage cloud torrenting has over regular torrenting is that the cloud service acts as a proxy. This means that using one bypasses local blocks on torrent sites and prevents peers (who could be copyright enforcers) from seeing your real IP address. They instead see the IP address of the cloud torrent server.

Content streamed or downloaded to your local devices is protected by HTTPS, so your internet provider (ISP) can’t see it.

Do I need to use a VPN with put.io?

A VPN is vital for protecting yourself when torrenting conventionally, but most of its advantages for torrenting (i.e. acting as a proxy and encrypting your data so your ISP can’t see it) are covered by put.io.

So if all you want is to torrent safely and you just don’t care about all the other privacy and geo-spoofing advantages a VPN offers, then using put.io great reduces the need for a VPN.

If you wish to hide your identity from put.io itself, though, you should use a VPN and take advantage of put.io’s (potentially) anonymous payment options.

Ease of use

The web interface

put.io is accessed on desktop systems via its web interface, which is neatly laid out and intuitive to use.

To download a torrent to put.io, just hit the New Transfer button and paste in a link. put.io accepts many links, but magnet links and torrent file URLs are the ones you are likely to use most often.

Videos and movies can be streamed inside the browser window using put.io’s media players. Similarly, eBooks saved in a variety of formats (we tested pdf and ePub files) can be previewed in your browser window.

Videos can, of course, be played full screen on your computer, or cast to a variety of devices for large-screen playback. And, as expected, all content can be downloaded to your local device.

The iOS/iPadOS app

Somewhat surprisingly, given that Apple bans all conventional torrent clients from its App Store, there is an official put.io app for iOS. This is almost certainly because the app does not allow you to add new torrents - only to stream, preview, or download content that has already been downloaded your put.io account.

As we show you in How to download torrents on iPhone, however, you can add new torrents in iOS via your mobile browser (in theory you can use any browser, but Firefox for iOS worked best for us).

Android apps

There are two unofficial put.io apps available in the Android Play Store, plus an official one for Android TV (which is not available in the Amazon App Store, but which can be easily sideloaded onto Fire TV devices such as the Amazon Fire Stick).

Of the two unofficial Android apps, we think Client for put.io by Vego labs (shown above) has the edge in terms of UI, and it allows you to stream and preview content inside the app. With put.io by Steven Schoen, content is played and previewed using external apps. But this is no great hardship, and we like the fact that it is fully open source.

Either way, both apps work well. And unlike the iOS app, they allow you to add torrents directly to your put.io account via magnet link or torrent file upload.

Browser add-ons

Adding content to put.io isn’t hard, but official add-ons for Firefox and Chrome make it even easier! Once installed, just right-click on a torrent link for the menu option to download it with put.io.

Final thoughts

put.io is a very slick and professional cloud torrenting service that does everything it says on the tin. Most of the content that we looked for was available instantly, which is just as impressive as the large list of devices and platforms catered to.

We have yet to review any other cloud torrent services formally, but based on our anecdotal experience, it is one of the best out there. We must state that it is also not the cheapest, which brings us to the million-dollar question - is it worth the money?

The main problem for put.io is that torrenting in the traditional way is basically free. You should use a good VPN, but these provide many other benefits and are much cheaper than put.io.

You can stream regular downloads locally to other devices on your LAN network using apps such as VLC, as well as cast to a variety of big-screen devices. You can also store downloaded content in the cloud on a self-hosted server or NAS drive and stream it to devices anywhere using Plex or similar free software.

But all of this takes some effort and know-how to set up, while put.io works seamlessly out-of-the-box. So if the price doesn’t put you off, then put.io comes highly recommended.

Has worked for almost six years as senior staff writer and resident tech and VPN industry expert at ProPrivacy.com. Widely quoted on issues relating cybersecurity and digital privacy in the UK national press (The Independent & Daily Mail Online) and international technology publications such as Ars Technica.